


Tsuioku

by tea_notes



Category: Final Fantasy Agito, Final Fantasy Type-0
Genre: Action & Romance, Flashbacks, Fluff, Love at First Sight, M/M, Time Loop, Tragic Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-13
Updated: 2020-01-13
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:55:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,114
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22238980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tea_notes/pseuds/tea_notes
Summary: Before trading a piece of his humanity for a way to save his love, Machina reminiscences of the days with Ace before Tempus Finis.
Relationships: Ace (Final Fantasy Type-0)/Machina Kunagiri
Comments: 1
Kudos: 14





	Tsuioku

Securely in Machina's arms was 'Ace', a small and peculiar person who was said to be 'Acceptance embodied' through out the military. All the weight centered on Machina's knees couldn't match the pain in his heart. He felt its slow descent into the center of his soul like a block of lead to the bottom of a drinking supply. He felt no joy at the sky clearing back to a starry blue, neither did he notice the air cleansed of Tempus Finis.

None of that mattered to him.

Nothing but the strained voice under him.

“Although it... seemed hopeless... you never gave up on me...!” Machina looked down at Ace. His eyes were no longer blue, or dyed purple from possession. They were milky, Ace had lost his ability to see, and even then... his thin finger tips caressed Machina's face. They slipped against the droplets of blood sliding down the angles of his maturing face, but they did not give up. They cradled his face from below. Machina could not help but to shed tears, words lost to him. “You knew I was still there...d-did you see me?”  
  
“N-no I... I just hoped really hard.” Machina's calloused hand was larger than Ace's. The size of it obscured Ace's under its warmth. “A-Ace...” He had so much to say, but fear overtook him. The distracting weight of time crushed his shoulders.

“Hehe... Your optimism....” Ace mused his lips trembled into a smiling form on his paled face. “I'm so lucky pragmatism escapes you... thank you so much, Kiri-chan. It was horrible... But the way you pushed on...The way you kept people from hurting me...I-I knew...I knew I'll be okay...”

“ _Are_ you okay?!” Machina had a desperate but small outburst. “Ace...! You can't see... You're so frail despite no one laying a hand or blade on you...! Are you actually okay?”

“I'm not consumed into Cerberus...I'm talking to you... Yes.” His cold hands never left Machina's face hot with health and emotion. “I can hear you, feel you... I'm so comfortable....Ah-” Ace was lifted further up, to where he could capture Machina's scent in his neck and hair. Even the harsh iron smell of fresh blood. He nuzzled closer and made his weakening body shudder. Rather than bring him warmth, it was another symptom of shutting down. Ace weakly clung to Machina. Rather than tangle his digits into a tattered indigo mantle, it was around his skin and hair. “Thank you...”  
  
“Ace...” For once, Machina held his tongue. He nearly asked why he was being thanked when he was clearly dying, but Ace's words echoed in his emptied mind. They were talking, talking and hugging... He pressed his face in the top of Ace's hair. Miraculously, it still held the same modest scent of vanilla he always liked to use... He pet his fingers through the strands of hair before gently pulling him back, cradling the back of his head to look at his familiar features. “I...don't think I can go home...”  
  
“Huh...Why?”

“...I can't... I never took you out of Akademeia. Never to my home, to have Izana's best recipe he couldn't carry all the way to campus... I can't go home without you...” He couldn't keep himself together. All of his tears started to fall, harsh and heavily. He sobbed and Ace felt it all in Machina's shoulders. With the help of his fingers... Ace found Machina's forehead and pressed their heads together.

“The Kunagiri family became my home... So I did...leave Akademeia some days.” He kissed his nose. He slowly slipped down in his increasing weakness, he however turned it into a positive. He pecked his lips—in which his head was cradled again with another meeting of their lips. Ace relaxed and pecked back for a third time. It felt like the last of his air left him with the action. He softly wheezed past the opening of his trembling lips... “You're...Izana's whole world...don't...lose sight....” He hiccuped on air, after, it became quick and hallow.  
  
“Ace--” Cold dread rippled down Machina's body as he squeezed Ace's shoulders. “Not yet—No! Ace!”  
  
“Mach....ii...” His eyes closed and lost the strength to be upright. To squeeze broader shoulders... He couldn't feel where his hands were (on his own ribs). He felt himself being lifted out of his mind to an unseen place. This time, he felt freed rather than trapped swirling around within a snarling container. Machina had saved him.  
  
“Ace, I'm sorry! Ace! _Please!!_ No....no...This isn't...” Machina curled over with his beloved still in his arms. He curled tightly and screamed all the tension out of his body. He then trembled after... wishing to have a wall to lean against, but there was nothing but open space. He was in the center of the magic school. He was at the center of the sky, under the north star, he was at the center of dead bodies all around him, some he slain in betrayal so they would not hurt Ace and his true body. He was what felt like the center of everything and everywhere, and it made him feel so lonely.

His red aura danced around his body and it left to no one... Ace was gone and probably would not have taken it anyway... It reached for the stars where souls are said to go, but it could barely go past the stray tips of his disheveled hair. The action made him dizzy. He could barely sit upright. Machina laid on his side with Ace still held closely in his arms. He wanted to follow Ace. Wherever that place was. He could not contain his tears, let alone put a lid on his sobbing. Not even laying down brought him comfort. He buried his face into blonde hair.

“When was the last time I laid with you like this...?” Machina's voice trembled.

…

“Too long...” His breath shuddered. “How long...?” His fingers tightened along with his slow intake of his scent. “Too long...that's how long. Missions... We were on separate missions.... Notes...You left me notes on my door, in my mail... I left...my Chocobo plush with you...” No matter how tightly he held this body, no matter the outline of his phantoma around him, the memory was trying to get away and Machina refused. His phantoma continued to pour out his vessel and swirl around their bodies. “I won't forget you...! I refuse...! I'd rather...I'd rather...”

Now he was the one feeling cold and floating in the air but...he had his memories, and he saw them neatly unravel behind closed eyes.


End file.
